


Rainy Day

by charvill1981



Category: The X-Files
Genre: Cancer, F/M, post-IWTB, pre-Revival
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2015-12-05
Updated: 2015-12-09
Packaged: 2018-05-05 00:53:52
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 2
Words: 3,207
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/5354717
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/charvill1981/pseuds/charvill1981
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>UPDATED WITH NEW CHAPTER</p><p>It’s a rainy day and someone has some news to share.</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. Chapter 1

The rain was pouring down so hard that he nearly rammed her car as he pulled in front of his house. He stopped just in time and put it in park, taking his phone from his pocket to see if she had texted or called and he had just missed it. But there was nothing. Suddenly, he heard his trunk open and he quickly grabbed his umbrella and stepped out of the car.

 

“Hey!” she yelled over the rain as he watched her pulling out grocery bags, getting soaked as the wind blew it sideways, rendering their umbrellas near useless.

 

“Hey,” he responded, approaching her slowly, despite the torrential downpour, out of fear that she might disappear if he moved too quickly.

 

“I saw you pull up and I thought you could use some help in this rain!” And then she ran, umbrella and groceries in each hand, up the porch before vanishing behind the screen door before he could even say “thank you”.

 

Shaking his head, he grabbed the other five bags, the adrenaline coursing through him making them feel light as a feather, slammed the trunk closed, and ran in after her. He was so mesmerized by the sight of her standing in the kitchen they shared for so many years, doing something as domestic as unloading groceries, that he froze three steps into the living room.

 

She finally noticed him standing there after emptying the bags she brought inside and walked up to him with a look of concern on her face. “You okay, Mulder?”

 

“Uh…yeah.” He nodded, as she took a couple of bags from his hand. “How did you know I would have groceries?”

 

Grinning over her shoulder, she answered, “It’s 1:30 on Sunday. You’ve gotten predictable in your old age.” She glanced up from her bag at where he was still frozen in the living room, staring at her. “You sure you’re alright?”

 

“I’m just really…” he paused, watching her retreat back into the kitchen. “Scully, what are you doing here?”

 

She turned, pausing as she pulled milk from one of the bags on the counter, and then took a deep breath like she was going to say something, but choosing instead to continue unloading them silently. He walked over, set his bags beside hers, and blocked her from grabbing anything else. Looking down at her, wet hair pulled back in a ponytail, black blazer and jeans soaked through and stuck to her skin, he was reminded of the first time they were in the field together. The sound of her laughter, so hard she lost her breath, had endeared her to him from the start. But that was over twenty years ago; another lifetime.

 

“What’s going on?” he said, genuine concern etched on his face.

 

She reached for the blue dishtowel resting on the cold granite and dabbed at the droplets on his face before using it on her own. It was the first time she had touched him in over a year, and he had to clutch the peninsula to keep from crashing to the floor. Finally, she set it down and looked him in the eye.

 

“I came to talk to you about something,” she said before taking his hand and pulling him towards the living room couch that was also his bed now, since the idea of sleeping in their old bed without her was out of the question. They sat, knees touching, on the black leather cushions and she still wouldn’t let go of his hand.

 

“Look, I don’t know what you’re about to say, Dana, but if you’re trying to get my attention, then mission accomplished,” he said, trying to lighten things up and mask the extreme anxiety he was feeling. What could she possibly need to tell me that would require showing up unannounced and making me sit down before she can tell me, he asked himself.

 

She smiled, but it wasn’t the one for which he was hoping. She rubbed her thumb in long, soft strokes over the palm of his hand, like she was reading the lines there. “I’m sorry I scared you, Mulder.”

 

He placed his free hand under her chin so he could see her eyes again. “But?”

 

The room was fairly dark, but he could still read the fear in her eyes and his stomach seized at the sight.

 

“I, uh…I was at work a couple of weeks ago and I’d been having headaches for several days in a row. I didn’t think anything of it because I usually get them this time of the year with the weather changing, and I’ve been working on a research grant in addition to some of my other—“

 

“Scully,” he interrupted, not being able to stand the suspense of her nervous rambling. Then, he gave her hand a quick, reassuring squeeze to remind her that it was just him. That she was safe. “Just tell me.”

 

She let out a shaky breath. “They found a brain tumor, Mulder. My cancer’s returned.”


	2. Chapter 2

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> See part 1

_Mycancer’sreturnedmycancer’sreturnedmycancer’sreturned_

 

In that moment, he became disconnected. He had heard of out-of-body experiences before, but this was the first time he went through it firsthand. Floating above them, he could see Scully talking to him, her hand on his arm, shaking him slightly as his body just sat there, slack-jawed and staring. Her lips were moving, but he couldn’t make out the words over the sound of her news playing on repeat in his brain. From above, he could see the panic building in her posture, her hand moving from his arm to his thigh, his hand, and then she placed the back of her hand against his cheek…and he crashed back down into the blissful warmth of her skin.

 

He closed his eyes against the feel, inhaling her scent and memorizing each second. He opened them again to find her blue eyes searching his, eyebrows raised in fear.

 

“Mulder?” she asked, tentatively, before letting out a breath and closing her eyes in relief. “God, you scared me.”

 

I scared you? he wanted to say. “I-I’m sorry,” he said, not moving his head a millimeter while her hand cupped the side of his face. “It’s just…”

 

“Shhh…it’s okay.” she interrupted, dropping her hand and scooting closer so they were now side-by- side. She shimmied out of her wet blazer and draped it over the arm of the couch. His eyes went wide as she helped him out of his, laying it in the spot next to hers. Then, snuggling under his chin, she wrapped her arms around his waist.

 

He immediately reciprocated the act, relishing her warmth, and rubbed his right hand up and down her arm. Soaking through the thin cotton layer, to the skin over his heart, was the intense, wet heat of her tears. He stroked the fingers of his left hand through her copper locks, her sobs so violent he could feel it reverberate through his ribs to his spine, as he rocked her gently back and forth.

 

These weren’t the same kind of tears she had cried all those years before when the first tumor was found. These were tears of defeat. That’s what scared him the most.

 

His hand in her hair, he allowed himself to graze the back of her neck with his thumb, grimacing when he felt the chip moving beneath his pressure. He heard her sniffle, as her sobs began to dissipate, and she sat up to face him. He reached behind her, grabbing his generic box of tissues from the end table and handing them to her.

 

“Thank you,” she said, taking a few to clean herself up. “I, uh…” she paused before raising her head to meet his eyes. “Mulder, you’re the first person I’ve told.”

 

He nodded, only mildly surprised. They had seen each other only once in nearly half a year, since the date of William’s 12th birthday, communicating only to take care of things like setting up separate accounts and the occasional drive-by to make sure the other was still alive and sane when they didn’t answer the phone or text back. But, he was one of the few people in her “new life” that knew her medical history and the horrors that came with it. He figured he was the easiest one to break it to first.

 

“How--” He cleared his throat, the tears that he had successfully kept back causing his voice to break. “How long since you found out?”

 

“This past Tuesday.”

 

 _Five days. Five days of carrying this around all alone._ His head dropped to his chest as though, in that moment, he physically took the weight of her burden and placed it on his shoulders.

 

“I didn’t know how…I’ve been thinking about it since I got the news. I didn’t even know if I should tell anyone at all.”

 

His head snapped back up as he looked at her incredulously. She wasn’t going to tell anyone?

 

She closed her eyes against his silent accusations. “Mulder, I left you,” she began, looking down at her hands. “Left you when you needed me. When you were sick!” she cried out, close to hysterics.

 

“Scully, stop!”

 

“It’s the truth, Mulder!”

 

He took her tiny hands in both of his. “No. It isn’t,” he said slowly, making sure she was hearing him. She lifted her head with tears of shame glistening in her eyes. “Scully, we separated because of my,” he sighed as the memory assaulted him, “actions. My decisions. It wasn’t safe for you to be here anymore.”

 

“But you needed me, and I wasn’t there. I was horrible to you.”

 

“I was pretty horrible to you, too,” he said with a smirk. He had hoped it would at least get a grin, but she was still too deep within her self-hatred. “When you needed me.”

 

“God,” she cursed between clenched teeth, burying her face in her hands for a second before looking at him again, studying his eyes like she was trying to read his mind.

 

His brows knitted in confusion. “What?”

 

“I was trying to figure out just when I lost myself to you,” she answered, shaking her head.

 

Mulder smiled, his heart feeling lighter for the first time since they sat down. “If it’s anywhere close to when I did, then sometime after the electricity went out in our motel in Oregon.”

 

She finally grinned in spite of herself, and he was overcome with the beauty of it. “That was a very long time ago, Agent Mulder.”

 

He nodded in agreement and they both looked down at their laps where their hands had managed to find each other. She gently caressed the back of his hand with her thumb. “I don’t know if I have the strength anymore…if there’s anything left to fight for.”

 

Her words flayed him open, but he knew that –right then— she needed something to put her back against. Pulling his hands, delicately, from hers, he turned his torso to open the drawer of the end table behind him. When he faced her again, he was holding a tattered, white envelope that looked as though it had been reopened a hundred times.

 

She raised an eyebrow, her curiosity piqued. He unfolded it and dumped the contents into his palm, then he opened his fist and she gasped in disbelief at the ring that lay within it.

 

“I bought it,” he started, before a nervous laugh escaped him. “I bought it on New Year’s Day.”

 

“New Year’s?”

 

“2000.”

 

His name came out of her mouth like a breath and she closed her eyes, so overwhelmed by his revelation. He reached up and wiped away the stray tear that had managed to reach her cheek.

 

“I wanted you to know that, Scully, because this is not something I am saying out of pity or fear. I’ve wanted to ask you every day and every night since I kissed you for the first time. Hell, BEFORE, then. And, yes, things have happened to us and things have changed over the last 13 years since but…but not this. Setting the ring back in the envelope, he got on his knees on the floor.

 

Her eyes went wide and she shook her head. “Mulder…”

 

“You said you don’t know if you have anything to fight for, Scully.” Just repeating her words was too much for him and he bit his lip against the sob that threatened to burst free. No longer able to hold back his tears, he pushed forward. “I’m telling you that you’re wrong,” he growled. “Fight for us. Fight for me. But more than anything, fight for yourself. Because I love you, Scully. And there’s nothing I want more than to spend the rest of my life with you.”

 

She looked down at him, trying to hold onto what little resolve she had left. In the last several days, she had decided to forego any kind of treatment. She was almost fifty years old, with a job that did indeed love, but outside of work…there was nothing and no one. Every battle she had ever fought, she had eventually lost. And, when she got the results of her test back, she was ready to add cancer to that list. But, now? Now, the intensity of his gaze and the passion of his words was making it extremely difficult. She opened her mouth to respond, but he stopped her, placing his hands on either side of her face.

 

“I have bitten my tongue so many hundreds of times, coming up with excuses for why it was the wrong time, what your reaction would be, or what your family might—“

 

“Mulder!”

 

“You’ve met your oldest brother, right?” he said, sarcastically, getting her to smile again.

 

He scooted closer towards her on his knees, straightening so that they were on eye level, their noses only inches apart. “When I saw your car today…when you dried the rain from my face,” he whispered huskily, his eyes closing as he remembered the sensation that went through him at such an intimate act. “I knew I couldn’t let you leave without showing you what you do to me.” He pressed a gentle kiss to her right cheek. “Showing you how much I’ve missed you.” A kiss on her left. “I don’t know why you trusted me with this information today. I don’t know if you’ve forgiven me for everything that separated us. But please, Scully…please let me be the one that holds your hand through this.” He let his forehead rest against hers before placing one last kiss on the tip of her nose.

 

She sighed, this time in contentment, and pressed her lips to his. When she tried to deepen it, he pulled back and reached for the ring in the envelope beside them.

 

He cocked an eyebrow as he removed it and gave her a sly grin. “Is that a ‘yes’, Scully?”

 

“Yes, Mulder.” He slid the elegant gold band with the princess cut diamond on her finger and they both stared at the sight. “It’s really beautiful. I still can’t believe you never…”

 

“It took me seven years just to pluck up the courage to kiss you, Scully. I’d say it fits my MO pretty well.”

 

They laughed together at that, and he moved off his knees to sit next to her on the couch.

 

“Mulder…I was so afraid of what you would say,” she said softly, resting back against him as he wrapped his arm around her. “When I left my apartment this morning…I never in a million years could have imagined this,” she confessed, playing with the ring that would now be a permanent fixture there.

 

He wanted to stop her, knew that he probably should, but he was curious. “What did you honestly think I would do, Scully?”

 

She turned a little to look over her shoulder at him, asking with her eyes if he really wanted to hear this. He nodded for her to continue. “I pictured a lot of things. Disbelief. Crying. Yelling…I…I expected a lot of anger. That’s why—“

 

“You were so helpful when you saw me.”

 

“I’m sorry—“

 

“Don’t, Scully,” he whispered, despite the disgust he felt inside over what she’d said. “I wanted to know. You don’t need to apologize for your feelings.”

 

She nodded and shifted in her seat, like she couldn’t get close enough to him.

 

“I do have one more question, though.”

 

“Yes?” she responded hesitantly.

 

“Why did you come to me first? I mean, if that’s how you thought it could go.”

 

Because I knew you’d tell me if I was making a mistake. She huffed a small laugh under her breath, grinning at the flashback his question brought on and praying for a similar outcome. “Because, I knew that if I was wrong--if you weren’t angry, if you didn’t shut down,” she paused, looking up at him again. “Then your reaction would be the one that I needed to make it through the others.”

 

He smiled down at her, nodding his understanding before kissing the crown of her head. She shifted again, burrowing deeper into him. “Scully?”

 

“The others,” he began, “Were you planning to tell them today?”

 

“It depended on how things with you went, actually. I didn’t want to go to my mother’s next if this had been a disaster. Why?”

 

“Because I’m not ready for you to leave just yet,” he answered, hugging her tighter to him. “Can you stay a little while longer?”

 

She nodded, unsure of her ability to speak at that moment.

 

He laid back and pulled her on top of his chest so they could both stretch out on the couch.

 

“Hi,” she giggled, beaming down at him.

 

“Hello.” Despite how much he enjoyed the view, he rolled her so she was in between him and the back of the couch; a position they had shared a hundred times before. He pushed the hair that had fallen across her face back behind her ear and gazed at her. “You know, this is not what I had envisioned when I left for the store today.”

 

“Hope I’m not keeping you from anything,” she grinned.

 

His sarcastic reply got stuck in his throat as she leaned forward to kiss him. With the touch of her lips against his, nothing else mattered. He could feel the hum in her throat as his hand caressed her neck, sliding down over her shoulder, her arm, her hip.

 

“I missed you so much, Mulder,” she said, against his mouth before pressing the length of her body against his.

 

“Scully,” he groaned. “I think you know exactly how much I missed you now. But, I am only so virtuous, and I know you probably don’t want to show up at your mom’s with—“

 

“Sex hair?”

 

He gasped in feigned shock, and brought her hand up between their bodies. “I am just fine with you right here for a few…days?”

 

Another smile spread across her face, and she couldn’t remember the last time she had felt this light. Looking into his hazel eyes, she found herself getting lost again. “There’s nowhere I’d rather be.”


End file.
